The latest analysis from Startup Europe Partnership confirms what has been evident on the ground for some time - the Nordics are building a vibrant tech ecosystem.

Over $6.5bn has been invested into 430 Nordic start-ups. A key group of companies has led the way with rounds of over $100m including Supercell, Spotify, King.com, Klarna, iZettle and Zendesk.

But it is not just investment, we are seeing very high levels of interest from key acquirers in buying the most promising companies in the Nordics. This is confirmed by the data which shows that 205 companies have been acquired in the last five years with 40% being acquired by US companies.

The Nordics are now established as one of the key clusters in Europe and we expect many more deals in the region.

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SEP identified 430 Nordic ICT scaleups that cumulatively raise over $6.5B in investments, 84% from venture capital funds and 16% via stock market.
Nordic scaleups raised – on average – $15M each and Sweden is the largest scale-up hub with 149 companies (35% of the total).
3% of scaleups are actually “scalers” – such as Supercell, Spotify, King.com, Klarna, iZettle, Zendesk – able to secure over $100M in capital to fuel their growth.
Gaming is the best performing sector of the Nordic ecosystem, Software the most “crowded”, Fintech the highest performing in terms of average capital raised.
205 startups exited via acquisitions in the last 5 years. 40% were completed by US companies, in line with what happens in other European countries. But surprisingly, 40% of deals were performed by local companies as well.